In Richard Susskind’s book “Tomorrow’s Lawyers”, he argues that lawyers will not survive for much longer unless they are prepared radically to change the way they work. Drawing upon his own research and his extensive experience of working with large law firms and senior judges, Susskind contends that “pervasive, irreversible and transformational” changes are needed in the legal marketplace. The case is no different in the UAE where the business landscape of the legal industry is rapidly evolving. We investigate some of the macroeconomic, market and technological changes below:

a) Macroeconomic Changes

Here are some of the new laws and regulations affecting practicing attorneys in UAE:

• Enforcement of mandatory professional indemnity insurance for all law firms
• Enforcement of mandatory health insurance for employees in Dubai
• Enactment of the Ministry of Justice’s Ministerial Resolution No. 666 of 2015 concerning the behaviour and manners of the lawyers in the UAE.
• Mandatory Registration of law firms and practicing lawyers with the Dubai Legal Affairs Department
• Obligatory completion of the Continuing Legal Professional Development program
• Introduction of VAT in January 2018
• Increase in the court and administrative fees for case registration across Abu Dhabi & Dubai.
• Increase in the inflation and cost of living

b) Market Changes

As of 2016, there are over 1000 registered legal practices in addition to hundreds of in-house counsel in the UAE. The sheer number of law firms has now made clients spoilt for choice driving the price of legal services to decrease whilst firms are willing to do more for less. In addition, the impact of the technologies on other industries has made clients also expect from firms to be more responsive and collaborative on their projects. However, this becomes increasingly challenging when a firm has high volumes of matters and caseload.

c) Technological changes:

Driven by client needs and the requirement for manage law firms as a business, firms and in-house counsel globally are turning their heads towards new technologies that can improve their operations, increase their bottom line and provide maximum satisfaction to their clients. The trend for law firms is to focus on the following key areas for improvement:

• Cloud Integration: Businesses no longer not need to be IT experts to integrate state of the art technology in their businesses. Cloud integration allows for 24/7 connectivity with smartphones, tables and PCs. Moreover, capital expenditures are reduced as businesses can eliminate the cost of obtaining a server and maintaining it as opposed to subscribing to a cloud environment hosted by a third party
• Managing Big Data & Information: Managing large amounts of data and information on to an intuitive platform for ease of use and retrieval. Businesses across all industries are moving from hardcopy storage to online storage which also reduces costs and is much more manageable.
• Workflow Automation: Developing best practice methods to obtain effective results for clients Managing and streamlining high volumes of cases is becoming a challenge. This is becomes even more challenging when cases are from various jurisdictions
• Security & Disaster Recovery: Prevent Cyber hacks & Malware by investing in high-grade security for information and data. In such cases, ensuring business continuity by having a disaster recovery plan has also become essential.